Oro Valley rejects petitions over club purchase

The Oro Valley Town Clerk rejected a petition Tuesday over a technicality.

The activist group Tee’d Off filed 3,158 signatures on a referendum petition last week — well over the minimum 1,148 signatures required — but the group did not write a serial number on each petition sheet. The number was required by state law, said town spokeswoman Misti Nowak.

“It is mandatory that the petition serial number appear in the lower right-hand corner of both the front and back of the petition,” she said in a written statement. “The submitted petitions did not bear the assigned serial number.”

Activists began collecting signatures after the Town Council approved a deal to buy El Conquistador country club and golf courses for $1 million. Last month’s 4-3 council vote came just a couple of weeks after the deal was made public.

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The town plans to renovate the country club and turn it into a recreation center. The deal also included a half-cent sales tax increase to pay for the renovations.

Tee’d Off wanted the public to vote on the deal and sought to force the matter onto the ballot.

After the group learned Friday that its petitions might be rejected, it tried at the last minute to gather enough signatures to submit a backup, but the group was short by 78 signatures, organizer Shirl Lamonna said. “The people want to be heard,” she said. “It’s hard for me to believe anyone on the council wouldn’t sit up and take notice.”

Lamonna said she didn’t recognize the importance of the serial number among the many details that must be included on the petition forms, but she said a court challenge is possible. “I wish we had better news for all the people who supported this effort,” she added.